Recent loss of Proton-M carrier rocket blamed on production fault

The accident happened on August 6

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MOSCOW, August 16 (Itar-Tass) — The August 6 abortive launching of the Proton-M carrier rocket was connected with malfunctioning of the Breeze-M accelerator block, which, in turn, was a result of a production fault, Chief of the Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) Vladimir Popovkin told journalists on Thursday.

An interdepartmental commission which is investigating the causes of the failure has been working since August 7, Popovkin said. "I dare say that the causes of the accident were established within ten days. It was connected with a production fault," Roscosmos chief said. He explained that the Breeze-M had a pressurization system of extra fuel tanks blocked.

The Proton-M carrier rocket provided with the Breeze-M accelerator block, which was launched from Baikonur cosmodrome at 11. 31 pm Moscow time on August 6, was to have brought two space apparatuses to the assigned orbit. One of them was the Russian "Express Md-2 "apparatus and the other one was the Indonesian satellite Telkom-2; both apparatuses failed to reach the assigned orbit.